The Look of Love (The Sullivans #1)(38)

“I most certainly did,” he said in a mock-offended voice. “They were eating out of my hands.”

“More like preparing to eat your hands,” she shot back.

He shrugged, spooning up some dessert to feed to her. He couldn’t have been more pleased when she ate it off his spoon without even the slightest hesitation. “See,” he said for her ears only, “eating right out of my hands.”

She rolled her eyes, but the flush that began to creep across her cheeks told him she was only just realizing how close the two of them had been tonight. He’d repeatedly touched her hands, brushed stray locks of hair away from her lovely, expressive face, and just plain stared at her like a lovesick teenager all night long.

“Did your mother know you did this?”

He grimaced. “Not exactly.”

Everyone else was talking about other things by now, but Chloe didn’t drop the lion photos. “Please tell me you were younger. And way stupider.”

He put on his most solemn face. “I was.” He waited a beat. “It’s been a good year since that assignment.” He could see her trying not to smile. And failing. “Would you have been worried about me, lovely Chloe?”

Her mouth parted slightly at the word and he realized his mistake when he went from half-mast to rock-hard in a millisecond. He’d needed to join his crew and models tonight. But every second he was here with the group was one less he was alone with Chloe.

“Would it have mattered?”

He held her gaze, suddenly serious. “Yes, it would have mattered. If I had known you back then, I never would have risked everything for the perfect photo.”

“No?”

He slid his hand over hers beneath the table. “No.”

But he’d risk everything for her.

Chapter Eleven

The moment they stepped inside the guest house, Chase kissed Chloe the way he’d been dying to kiss her all day. He kissed his way from her sweet mouth to the pulse point in her neck and felt her heart race beneath his lips, his tongue.

“You have such lovely, soft skin.” He slid the straps of her silky top from her shoulders. “Such lovely, responsive br**sts.” He pressed kisses over the swells that rose up out the top of her bra. “And you make such lovely little sounds when I’m kissing you.”

When he looked back into her eyes, they were dark with desire. Along with the growing emotion she simply wasn’t able to hide from him.

He’d wanted to take his time with her tonight, wanted to love her slow and easy, take all night if he had to. Instead, he was saying, “I can’t wait another second,” just as she said, “Hurry.” She slipped her panties off as he yanked off his pants and boxers.

“Please tell me you have a condom,” she said and, thank God, he did have one that he’d stashed in his pocket that morning just in case an opportunity arose to sneak away from the shoot and make love to her.

A moment later he was sheathed and lifting her up so that her dress bunched up around her waist. She had her arms wrapped around his neck, her legs around his hips as he drove into her.

She gasped out his name and he found her mouth and kissed her. But it was more than a kiss. And what they were doing together was so much more than a quickie against the front door.

* * *

Her tongue laved the spot on his shoulder where she’d bitten down into a tendon as she’d come apart in his arms. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.” She looked stunned by what she’d done to his skin. “I’ve never done anything like that before.”

Beyond glad that she was starting to really let herself go with him, he said, “You’re the one who’s going to have bruises from the door if I don’t get you into the bath right away.”

Her legs still wrapped around his hips, he carried her through the house to the bedroom. Continuing to the bathroom, he kept her right there on his lap as he turned on the taps and tested the water. “Perfect.”

After pulling her dress off and removing her bra, he lowered her into the tub. She seemed reluctant to let go of him.

“Aren’t you coming in, too?”

He didn’t say anything at first, just let himself drink her in. He loved the way she’d held onto him. Being with her like this was so natural, so right. Chase knew he could never be with a woman who spent her life worrying about what she ate, about whether or not she had cellulite or a little extra flesh on her stomach. He spent all day with women—and men—who were obsessed with what was on the outside.

Chloe’s natural self-confidence, which he was watching return by leaps and bounds with every hour that passed, along with her very real beauty, was the perfect antidote to all of that self-conscious preening. He loved the fact that her nails weren’t painted, that she wasn’t waxed bald between her thighs, that she hadn’t dyed her hair or whitened her teeth. She looked like a woman should.

“You’re staring at me.”

“Yes, I am. And you’re so lovely I’m going to be staring a whole lot more.”

She blushed. “Come join me in the tub.”

But even though he was desperate to get in the water with her, all day he’d been thinking about the conversation they’d had that morning.

“Remember that first night I found you in the tub?”

“I honestly don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget.”